A history of English sexual morals / by Ivan Bloch ; translated by William H. Forstern.

  • Iwan Bloch
Date:
1936
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: A history of English sexual morals / by Ivan Bloch ; translated by William H. Forstern. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    effects were always striking. There were lavish ballet shows such as no other capital could provide. As early as the be- ginning of the 'seventies of last century a super ballet with ninety-nine performers was produced at the 4 Alhambra \ A most peculiar phenomenon in the eighteenth century and during the first thirty years of the nineteenth, were the prostitutes who danced in the streets, exhibiting their charms to passing men in this way. Adrian, in his English Sketches, records that one day as he was walking in Bird Cage Walk he saw a group of people forming a circle round a girl who was dancing with considerable grace and still greater abandon. When she was tired of dancing she sat down on the ground and sang obscene songs, to the great delight of the crowd. Suddenly she leapt to her feet and threw herself on the neck of a sentry at the Horse Guards Parade. With great diffi- culty the sentry released himself, and the girl then went dancing and singing towards the Mall. Adrian heard from someone in the crowd that the girl was a prostitute, who had started her profession as a ' high class ' courtesan, and had gradually sunk to dancing in the streets in order to find temporary lovers. The low-class dance-halls were full of prostitutes. English and German prostitutes regularly frequented such places in the East End, singing the most abominable obscenities to the accompaniment of the dance music. A few decades ago Maidstone, Greenwich, Gravesend, had dance-halls of doubtful reputation, where dancing was linked with prostitution, and where immoral ballets, such as the 6 Drawers Balletwere performed. Erotic dances were also performed at the brothels. Casanova describes a ' satyr dance 5 which he witnessed at a London brothel called ' The Cannon \ Up till a few decades ago erotic balls were held at London brothels. Nellie Cawsten, proprietress of an 'exclusive' [622]